At the opposite pole are the intransigently Puritan Cobleys, who secretly hold Protestant worship - a highly dangerous act under Catholic rule.

Their strong religious principles do not, however, stop the Cobleys from resorting to occasional underhand tricks to cheat their competitors and employees, and dabbling in the new lucrative field of the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

They get Philbert Cobley burned as a heretic for conducting a Protestant service and drive the Willards virtually bankrupt by strictly enforcing anti-usury laws which are usually regarded as a legal fiction (since in fact all merchants take interest on loans).

Though set in respectively the 16th Century and the 20th, both novels have a rich commoner woman (Margery Fitzgerald in the one book, Daisy Peshkov in the other) marrying the scion of a titled English aristocratic family.

Bill Sheehan of The Washington Post summarizes the book by commenting: "Like its predecessors in the Kingsbridge series, “A Column of Fire” is absorbing, painlessly educational and a great deal of fun.

The central theme of this latest book — the ongoing conflict between tolerance and fanaticism — lends both relevance and resonance to the slowly unfolding story of England’s past.